If Life Gives You Lemons…Do a Beauty Treatment!

Lemons are amazing for many things other than lemonade. You can use lemon as the sole ingredient or an one of the ingredients of a multitude of beauty treatments for face, body and hair. Many of you will be familiar with the struggle of darkened elbows, knees, underarms, and even the darkening of skin due to scars. Due to the high content of vitamin C in lemons, they are fantastic for skin lightening use. You can just grab a half of a lemon and rub it on the areas you desire to lighten, leave on for a good 15-20 minutes (less for sensitive skin) and rinse. Repeat periodically (two to three times a week) until you see the desired change. To add more power to this lightening treatment, mix the juice of a lemon with a half a teaspoon of baking soda and rub the mixture on the desired area (adjust the amount of juice and baking soda depending on the size of the areas you wish to treat).

Not enough? Lightening skin is not all you can do with lemons. They are also great for mixing with honey for a delicious hair mask that will give your hair a beautiful shine and if you mix the lemon juice with honey and sugar you have a tasty body scrub! What else can you ask for? You literally have a key ingredient to any kind of at hoe body treatment sitting in your fridge!

Have a lemon beauty recipe for us to try? post it in the comments!

Stay true – Chantal

Chocolate Obsession Body Scrub

As if chocolate wasn’t fabulous enough as an edible, it is also serves as an amazing and deliciously smelling body scrub! All you need are three ingredients, Cocoa powder, sugar and olive oil. Just mix all the ingredients together, gently apply on the desired areas in small circular motions to exfoliate the skin, leave on for 15 minutes, and rinse. The antioxidants in the cocoa will help restore elasticity to the skin, fight ageing, provide hydration, and its properties will also help reduce skin breakouts. Bonus point, the caffeine in the cocoa powder can even give you an energy boost!

Enjoy this delicious treat 😉

Stay true – Chantal

Great Natural Anti-Inflammatory

Chamomile tea is definitely one of my favorite teas to drink, especially at night time to help me sleep and when I have a stomach ache or sore throat due to its antibacterial properties. What many don’t know is that chamomile tea is super useful for many other things, including skin care. Chamomile tea is a great natural anti-inflammatory, analgesic and antioxidant that can help treat skin conditions like eczema, rosacea and acne. It also helps reduce the appearance of wrinkles scars, dark circles and tightens pores.  

Here are a few ways you can use chamomile for the above benefits:

• Boil 1 tablespoon of dried chamomile or 1 bag of chamomile tea in a cup of water. Let it cool down and using a cotton ball, dip it in the tea and apply on your face with gentle taps after your face wash. Do not rinse your face, let your skin absorb the tea. If you have areas with a skin condition, you can place the soaked cotton balls or squares on them and leave them there for a good 10 minutes while the tea is still a bit warm.
• A nice face mask can be made with ¼ cup of chamomile tea, ¼ cup of rosewater and 2-4 tablespoons of honey (just enough to make the mix a bit thick). Cover your clean face with the mix and leave it on for 10-15 minutes and rinse off.
• To reduce eye puffiness and dark circles, boil 2 chamomile tea bags in one cup of water. Let them cool down a bit, but while still warm, squeeze the excess tea out of the tea bags and place them on your eyes (make sure you cover the dark circles). Leave them on for 10 minutes and let your skin absorb the tea.

Give chamomile a try and let me know what you think!

Stay true – Chantal

Feeling Lost When it Comes to Skin Care? You Are Not Alone!

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I do a lot of research on how to take care of my skin, especially because I love to share my tips with all of you, but our skin goes through sooooooo many changes, that sometimes it is hard to keep up. What once worked wonders on your face may be causing breakouts now. As we go through hormonal changes, aging, weather changes, and environment changes, our skin suffers the consequences and we are left to figure out what new routine works best while healing whatever damage has already happened. I really do believe that sometimes having people to go to with questions about different products and skin changes is super important. Reading books, reaching out to experts and looking up information online is great, but I love having that personal interaction. I have found my personal skin care heaven with Origins by Esteé Lauder. They have a location at my local mall and I have come to get to know the girls that work there pretty well. They are incredibly helpful when I am struggling with anything in my routine, they give you samples so you can find what works for you, they will help you match colors, give you helpful tips and more! I also love that with their rewards membership you can get discounts and free facials! Also, that they have a lot of natural product options. My point with this is, take the time to find a store where they have a lot of the products you like, where the employees are super helpful and willing to engage in conversations and educate you in skin care. I hate when people push me to buy things, but when someone is willing to take some time to help figure out what is going on with my skin, give me potential solutions, and gives me a facial regardless of my purchase… that is an amazing experience. Having someone to go to is priceless. Try it out, find your skin care heaven and let me know of your experience and what you learned from it 😊

Stay true – Chantal  

Ooh Honey, Honey!

I come from a family of ranchers and farmers on my mother’s side. Her grandparents and everyone prior owned a lot of land, lots of animals, and farmed all sorts of things. I got to see a bit of this when I was little and the joy of those memories when I got to go see and pet all the animals, see the baby piglets being born, play with the baby goats, and horseback riding will forever remain. All those things are in the past, the people from back then are gone, but besides all those wonderful memories, I got to learn a few things. I learned how to properly treat animals, respect all living creatures, and that pretty much everything we need we can find in nature. One of my grand uncles (over 80 years old) has always used one secret ingredient to remain healthy and young looking… HONEY! Yep, honey. Most of us have used this as a sweetener or beeswax in various products, but him and his family use it for nearly everything related to self-care and nutrition. He never eats refined sugars, the only sweetness he adds to anything is honey. He also uses honey daily as hair mask, face mask, body scrub and more! Well… he looks like he is in his 50s! A couple of weekends ago, Kim and I went to our local community market and we saw this vendor called Soul Honey, and yeah… I freaked out! Flashback to my grand uncle. The sweet couple selling the products told me all about their love for their bees and the honey. They make anything from moisturizing cream to soaps, and they also sell their delicious honey. Some additional things they make for themselves but that just wouldn’t last packaged or would be too much for them to take to the booth, they write on little cards, so you can try making them yourself at home.  Another thing I really liked about them is that they care for the preservation of bees and know the importance they have in our ecosystem, so they offer free beekeeping presentations for kids. I personally love when I find people that are passionate about what they do, especially when they care about our beautiful planet. If you want to check them out visit, www.texassoulhoney.com. Here are some of the products I ended up buying to try, so far I like them all and their honey is delicious!  I challenge you to try more local products, they boost the local economy and you can find a lot of cool products like these.

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Stay true – Chantal

Hellooooooooo Sexy Pores!

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Gross but yeah, pores are crazy important. You need to make sure to clean your pores of impurities constantly in order to have healthy looking skin, minimize black heads and pimples. If you let your pores get all clogged up, your skin is going to look less than appealing, oily and dirty. The charcoal peel off mask is one of my favorite face masks because on top of being crazy satisfying to take it off, it is great at pulling dirt, blackheads, bacteria, dead cells, and all sorts of impurities from the skin. Now, do BEWARE because although the mask is great at removing impurities, it takes all of the oils from the skin when you peel it off and that is not recommended, it can also irritate your skin, so you have to be gentle when applying and taking it off. On top of that, once you have peeled off the mask, you need to make sure to wash your face to remove all mask residues, use a toner to seal off your pores and moisturize. I also wouldn’t recommend using this type of mask too frequently as it can make your face look dry and irritated if you overuse it. Twice a month or just as needed should be good.

What’s your favorite peel-off mask?

Stay True – Chantal

3 Ways to Use Avocado

Y’all – if you’re not using avocado for literally EVERY use in your life.. you’re missing out! I won’t take total credit for these “recipes” (Chantal is the resident beauty expert here), but I got to be the guinea pig and L-O-V-E-D all of this.

In case you didn’t know, you can use avocado in your meals (duh), for your face, and for your hair. Avocado is rich in healthy fatty acids, and can be extremely moisturizing externally. It also has potassium, letithin, and more minerals that nourish your body inside and out.

Avocado Toast

Ingredients:
Toast
Avocado
Corn
Cilantro
Greek Yogurt
Cotija Cheese
Salt/Pepper (optional)

 

Avocado Hair Mask

Ingredients:
1 1/2- 1 3/4 Avocado
2-3 tbsp Honey
2-3 tbsp Olive Oil 

(Adjust ingredients based on how long your hair is)

 Put on your hair for 20-30 minutes to hydrate! Then wash your hair as normal.

Avocado Face Mask

Ingredients:
1/4 Avocado
1-2 tbsp plain yogurt
1-2 tbsp honey

Place a THICK layer all over your face and leave on for 20-30 minutes! Once it’s dry, wash off and feel the difference!

Hopefully you try out these recipes to get all the benefits out of avocados. Have a great weekend!  

Mission: Hair Rescue

Our poor hair goes through a lot, sun exposure, heat damage from our various hair styling techniques or chemical damage from hair dyes and bleaching. Even not using the right type of hair products can damage our hair greatly. It is super important to give our hair and scalp some love. This is one of my favorite hair treatments, because it makes my hair feel full, shiny and gorgeous. On top of that, it smells super nice and helps with hair growth by addressing scalp health and hair breakage! For this treatment you’ll need:

• Olive Oil
  • Rich in vitamins A, E and antioxidants
  • Helps bring and seal in moisture to hair and fight dandruff
  • Protects the keratin and strengthens hair
  • Gives your hair a beautiful shine and softness
  • Helps repair damage caused by sunlight and pollution
• Castor Oil
  • Rich in Omega-6 and Omega-9
  • Seals in moisture and adds sine t hair
  • Anti-bacterial and anti-inflammatory for a healthy scalp
  • Strengthens hair
  • Makes curly and frizzy hair more manageable
• Almond Oil
  • Rich in protein, Omega-9, fatty acids, and vitamin E
  • Helps to strengthen hair and adds shine
  • Makes hair smooth and easier to style
  • Helps diminish split ends
  • Addresses scalp conditions such as seborrheic dermatitis and scalp psoriasis
  • Bonus points: makes this oil treatment smell delicious!

Note: Do not use almond oil if you suffer from nut allergies.

Mix all three oils in a glass jar or any jar you can heat up on the stove top. Make sure you have a good amount of each oil depending on the length of your hair. You may also want to make some extra to store for additional treatments. Place the jar in the center of a small pot. Fill about a quarter of the pot with water and heat it up on the stove top on medium heat. As the water starts boiling, it will slowly heat up the oils. When the mix of oils is warm enough, remove it from heat and spread it all over your hair without directly applying to the scalp. You can apply the treatment on clean dampened hair to seal in that moisture, but it is also great on dry hair. Once you saturate your hair with the mix of oils, put your hair up in a bun and cover it with a plastic cap. Leave the treatment on your hair for 45 minutes to an hour and then rinse and wash your hair.  Remember that oil can be a bit hard to wash off so make sure you get it all off. Style as usual and feel the difference… freaking amazing, I know!

 Do you have a favorite hair oil treatment? Share it with us!

Stay true – Chantal

Antioxidant Ice Cube

Fight skin aging by sealing your pores after your face wash routine with a red wine ice cube! Red wine contains antioxidants that help restore collagen to maintain your face looking youthful and nourished. Let your skin absorb the wine and do not rinse. If you do this at night, it will even help you to go to sleep as red wine also contains melatonin. Just a couple more reasons to love wine, cheers!

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